African Child Soldiers

Introduction

A child soldier is anyone under 18 as part of any armed force or movement. Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers suggests that more than half a million children have been recruited into armed forces in more than eighty-five countries worldwide. Some of these children are under the age of ten. These children have been abducted in the street, removed from the classroom or refugee camps. Many others are forced to leave their homes at gunpoint, while playing close to home or walk down the road. Some children have joined in voluntarily because of conflict with families, poverty, and the collapse of basic social services.

Children, being innocent and impressionable nature, are extremely susceptible to military participation and recruitment to commit acts of violence (Craig, 22). Majority of children in African countries are forced to join militia, rebel, and armed forces groups that are fighting against the government to hold their control in the country (Gates, 42).

Recruitment and Implications of African Child Soldiers in Military Services

The facts indicate that the recruitment and use of children has become the preferred method for waging war for African militant groups (Wessells, 71). Basically, the drivers of recruiting and using child soldiers are many and often interrelated. Children, like anyone else, are vulnerable in the face of military recruitment and involvement in military actions. Children are considered as impressionable and innocent; therefore, they are forced to join or lured into the ranks of armed groups in Africa (Wessells, 79). Whatever form of recruitment African child soldiers are victims of militant groups in all forms of recruitment. Their participation in armed conflict militant groups directly affects their emotional and physical state. They are often subjected to abuse; majority of them went to death, get killed or experience sexual violence (Gates, 51). Many of them are involved in the killings; the majority had serious and lasting psychological effects.

The massive participation of children in hostilities was made possible by the development of cheaper and easy and simple to use automatic weapons. The data indicate that many warfare groups use drugs as the only methods for the recruitment and use of children (Rosen, 65). In reality, majority of interrelated factors determine the causes for the recruitment and use of children as soldiers in militant groups. Throughout history, in many countries of Africa, children had been involved in military campaigns, even when such practices were against the cultural uses. Reports show that there are more than 1200,000 children who are under African child soldier slavery (Wessells, 111). Most dominant countries include Somalia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Angola, Uganda, Kenya, Congo, Ethiopia, Central African Republic, Nigeria, Ghana, and Cameroon (Craig, 102).

Recruitment and use of child soldiers is an entrenched feature of the ongoing armed conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The Mai Mai group is among the groups that have recruited the largest number of children in its militia group (Wessells, 132). The environment that perpetuates child recruitment by the Mai Mai is characterized by a chronic ...